American Booksellers Association and Abigail Shrier

Books are, indeed, dangerous. Very dangerous: they make you think.

But what is even more dangerous is people not allowing you to think. People not allowing you you refute statements made in books. People not allowing you to defend statements made in books.

Long live dangerous books!

Book banning in America was on the radio when I was there in 1999. They wanted Harry Potter out of schools (witchcraft is of the devil) but the discussion included "Wizard of Oz," an American classic.

I think there are areas of conservative religious bias where this practice is long established in schools and public libraries. I am a teacher, so am not suggesting my school library should stock, or issue, any book. However, the idea that books are dangerous seems to be well established there, making this issue far less controversial than here.

Which is weird given the constitution.

The statement will also mean that should you run into any kind of trouble through stocking the book the ABA won’t support you.

thymeofmylife

However, the ABA has practically announced that it is now in the business of censorship. And it is elevating a small group’s desire to have that kind of influence over what American’s read over all other groups.

Which other group would it do this for?

Now any bookseller who does stock it will have to admit to being aware of the horrific harm the book causes and stocked it anyway.

So much for the first amendment

This statement has a whiff of coercive control.

I think you’re missing the point Thyme! Nobody has said the ABA will be physically preventing booksellers from stocking the book but it is inevitable there will be an impact. If you were a bookseller who wasn’t au fait with the issues and this happens it’s going to give you pause before stocking the book let alone putting it in a window display as you might do with other potential bestsellers. You don’t want to be a bad person and you also don’t want your shop to come under attack.

Just clarifying! Not trying to miss any points. Lots of comments here saying stupid booksellers can't read, and that American booksellers will be missing the chance to sell the book. Just wanted to point out that's not factually accurate.

The ABA aren't responsible for their members' decisions on what to stock, and they're not the only body promoting those titles - publishers will do that directly too.

But I expect you knew that

I have really enjoyed reading several books recommended on here. I have created a section on the book case in my living room for them and some are turned to face the room, in the manner of the politician zoom interview book case.
I have also discovered Hive, so it is all good.
I read Irreversible Damage when it first came out. It will stay clearly visible when we are allowed visitors again.

The parallels with blasphemy laws and religion is striking

And in the US it's usually religious conservatives trying to ban books like "Heather Has Two Mommies" and "Tango Makes Three" which is about two penguin dads or "Naked Lunch" by William S Burroughs or Judy Blume's, "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret."

In 2020, they were still trying to ban Toni Morrison's "The Bluest Eye."

harmharmharmityharmfulviolentviolentegregioustraumaticharmfullerviolentharm

Does anyone think that maybe the Booksellers of America are taking the proverbial?

The booksellers of America are free to stock the book if they choose. No-one has banned it. The ABA are a trade association who support booksellers, they don't have any power over what shops stock.

PurgatoryOfPotholes

I've got a very similar project going, but I hadn't thought of making a historical record of why I bought them!

I recommend keeping something with them, it's quite interesting to look at the print outs and clippings that go with the books. And I think as time passes, if DS or anyone else takes an interest in my shelves, it will be good for them to see the reasoning behind the project.

I have the JKR book Troubled Blood, which has a lot of false reviews claiming the book is 900+ pages of transphobia, so I printed off a couple of those, plus her statement on why she believes in single sex spaces etc, and of course the book itself which disproves the false reviews if only people bother to read it. I think it will add a lot of context to these very strange times we in as far as sex and gender is concerned, and I hope it will help to show who really was on the right side of history.

I feel a bit guilty saying this, but the cancellations have been fantastic for me as a reader. I (and my kids) have discovered so many talented authors. I'd been finding that many recent releases in our usual preferred genres were a bit formulaic. However, to a woman and man, every book we've tried from a cancelled author has had depth.

I have found this too, I've really enjoyed giving all these new books and authors a chance and it has brought me out of my comfort zones when it comes to reading. It has also bumped me up the scale of angry feminist as well, but I'm not finding that to be a bad thing

So many organisations pass things on to one or two activists, who come out with this crap. Nobody else will genuinely see the book’s inclusion as “violence”, but only the handful of trans activists on staff are allowed to have an opinion about it.

Providing a sinecure for one of them may well serve as the hospital treatment needed to remedy this serious violence and ease the pain.

Holy moly. Saw it was at #51 in Amazon.com bestsellers. Not bad.

That is the hardback. Paperback is #4.

This is selling many thousands of copies.

It's almost like sabotage.

The first couple of sentences read like some kind of kink thing. They've been very, very bad.

It's on Scribd as an ebook. I shall read it after I finish Helen Joyce's book.

@StPaulsCathedral

On the US site, Irreversible Damage is at numbers 1, 2 and 3 in the bestsellers for the LGBTQ+ section. Followed by Helen Joyce's book 'Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality' at spots 4 & 5. Oh the horror.

I read her book partly out of that motivation too. It was so universally condemned and decried by even relatively sane left-wing / feminist writers that I had to see what the fuss was about.

It's not the best book in the world but it does bring to light some serious concerns about how gender-nonconforming young women are being pressured to identify as male and undertake serious medical steps that will have lifelong consequences for them on relatively flimsy grounds. That is something we need to be able to discuss freely as a society and silencing debate won't work.

SnoopyLights

I've actually started a project of buying banned books or authors who are being targeted by cancel culture.

It didn't start out to be particularly focused on feminist or gender-critical books but it's taken quite a steep curve in that direction recently.

It's been very interesting through, a mixture of fiction and non-fiction, quote a range of subjects and genres, and I try to print of a couple of articles about why the book or author has been targeted for banning or cancellation to go with the book, usually the article that brought the book to my attention is the first one to be printed with it.^

If it's more an author being cancelled than any one of their books (for example being dropped from an event or a panel, like Amanda Craig or Milli Hill) I will pick a couple of their books at random and add them to the ever growing collection with an explanation about why I've included them.

I've got a very similar project going, but I hadn't thought of making a historical record of why I bought them!

I feel a bit guilty saying this, but the cancellations have been fantastic for me as a reader. I (and my kids) have discovered so many talented authors. I'd been finding that many recent releases in our usual preferred genres were a bit formulaic. However, to a woman and man, every book we've tried from a cancelled author has had depth.

I've ordered my copy and it will arrive tomorrow. Wish me luck opening it - just in case the book jumps out and immediately attacks me.

So what if they published something by a Nazi? (Which I am not saying applies to any of these books.) Publish and throw it open to debate. You cannot defend or refute ideas if you pretend they don't exist, and you can't defend or refute ideas if you pretend that they are sacred.